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Greenville or bust

It was almost bust. We woke up on the last day of our boys' spring break determined to have an adventure. With Mom in town we wanted to take her to see something new and decided that Greenville, SC, was the spot. Our always reliable car was making a funny noise, making us uneasy about taking it on a long journey. After connecting with a mechanic, we determined that it was a fix that needed to happen which would deprive us of a car for the day. Undeterred, we rented a couple of cars for the day and drove to Greenville anyway. We had a fun day despite the crazy start and overall we were glad to make the trip.

Downtown Greenville is charming with its Main Street USA shops, cascading waterfall with a suspended walking bridge, and manicured gardens. We had a lovely time walking around.


































We decided to check out miniature train museum in the downtown area. It was staffed by a group of ardent train hobbiests-- old men with the hearts of young boys who now spend their days tinkering with toy trains. The set-up was pretty impressive and we enjoyed watching the trains go round; the lights even dimmed for a night view of the little town. 

















We ate dinner at Tupelo's Honey Cafe and browsed through the Mast General Store. The evening took an odd turn; I went to the car to get a diaper for Ellie and not more than a minute or two after I came back into the store, someone jumped from a five story car garage and landed a few feet from where I went into the store. Sadly the result was not pleasant but I was grateful to be spared being a witness. We were able to exit out another way and get our kids away from the scene before they started to wonder what had happened. We finished the evening at the Roper Mountain Science Center with a visit to the planetarium. Rowan learned about space at school and was so excited with the opportunity to look through the big telescope to see Jupiter. He waited ever so patiently for nearly two hours but just as he stood on the stool to look, a large cloud covered the planet and there was nothing to see. I was so proud of him that he didn't melt down and was okay that he couldn't see anything. There was a smaller telescope outside and he had several chances to look through it so he seemed to think the evening was still fun even though he missed the big look. His passion for space has continued, though; we were treated by our friend, Jason, with a look through his telescope about a month later and we were able to get an amazing view of Jupiter, Mars, and Venus, a lovely look at the moon, as well as many stars. Rowan was "over the moon," as they say. :) 

Despite a few funky events, the trip overall was a lot of fun and we had a great adventure together. 


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